Letters:

Singer in action

Sir,
At various times over the years you have made mention of the four 1935 TT Singers. You might therefore be interested in the enclosed photograph of the very last race to be won by one of these cars — that for “Vintage and Venerable Sports-cars” at the 1962 Sir John Horsfall meeting at Silverstone.

JF Holford, Churt, Surrey

Airedale adventure

Sir,
How astonishing, after so long, to hear of another Airedale (Motor Sport, January 1989, page 59). I always claim that an Airedale was the first car I drove — though it was only down a private drive, and ended ignominiously in the bushes; I was 12 at the time, so it must have been in 1924. My father worked for Nobel Industries, and was seconded to its Birmingham subsidiary Kynoch Ltd, which provided him with the Airedale, so I suppose it was registered in its name, but I don’t remember the number plate at all. I clearly remember the sound of its tickover — “ticky, ticky” at the front, “tewf tewf at the rear. It was an open four-seater with the novelty of Balloon tyres. We were told only six had been made. By no stretch of the imagination could the engine have been called “dead smooth”, but perhaps not all had the Dorman engine — though, come to think of it, one of the production staff was called Walter Dorman …

As an irrelevant aside Kynochs, which at one time made gas-engin., once built a car at the whim of its Chairman. The engine eventually ran well on the bench, but when installed in the ash-framed chassis proved unstartable, and the Chairman lost interest. Some time later Mr Mackie, the fitting-shop manager, seeking something for his apprentices to do, told them to find out why. Easy: the long copper exhaust-pipe had been filled with Wood’s Metal for support while making sundry bends. One bend was still so occupied.

GAD Smith, Burford, Oxfordshire